


they say it works like magnets. they don't know shit.

by sybilius



Series: a hustler, a spy, and a professional assassin walk into a bar [1]
Category: MacGyver (TV 1985)
Genre: Audio Epistolary, Depression, First Person, Food, M/M, Pining, Pre-Slash, S02 E18: Partners, Storytelling, Tape Recording, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Unresolved Tension in General, very shitty food might I add
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-08 18:31:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20840090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sybilius/pseuds/sybilius
Summary: Jack Dalton has a lot of time to think to himself in the hospital. Not a whole lot of people to talk to.*Set during S02 E18 in the backstory, where Jack is in the hospital with two broken legs and a broken arm.





	they say it works like magnets. they don't know shit.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [deepandlovelydark](https://archiveofourown.org/users/deepandlovelydark/gifts).

> I asked D for a prompt; after humming around Jack Dalton angst, I came up with this! 
> 
> Always fun to revisit writing not just first person present tense but...this.

Is this thing on? Is it work--

Okay, guess that answers that. Can't really stomach listening to Fleetwood Mac for the sixtieth time, seeing as I’ve had it on repeat all day. Mac might have thought of bringing me another tape!

Guess this is his tape. Maybe I shouldn’t be recording over it. 

It’s pretty quiet here, this late. Just the occasional doctor running by the halls. Nothing to do but sleep, can’t watch TV after hours. 

I-- I’m hoping he’ll come by. Now that the nurse has gone home, and I’ve got nothing to do with my hands, hand, hah, hah. And that’s  _ his _ fault, too!

Not that I blame him, really. Who could? He’s probably out helping some old lady cross the street right now. Hmmf. Not driving the cab that ended up taken out by a bazooka, that’s for sure. 

What time is it, about eight o clock? Bout time to get a drink, if I could move. Not that Mac would be doing that, when I think about it he’s probably at home. 

  
He’s probably at my home. And that was -- shoot. That was the last time I had a drink, too, when he came by to cheer me up, I called him at ten o’ clock. He joked that he was about to go to bed, I was drunk enough that I laughed. Knew he was serious. I-- 

I guess that’s what I can’t stop thinking about. Breaking my legs thinking about a blonde, good joke. Broke my arm doing that too. I just --

This is stupid.

  
  
  
  


But I swear it was something...different. I don’t...I don’t think I was imagining it! O.k, so I do think that. I was drunk. What’s the difference. I don’t know. I’ll tell it to you sober, if I have to.

‘You’, like I’m not going to throw this tape in the trash soonest chance I get. 

So. I called MacGyver up after work one day, feeling -- well, a lot like I do now. I could. I could really use a drink, thinking about it too much. Better stop thinking, I -- I was telling you a story. About Mac. 

He doesn’t spend a lot of time with me. I mean. Part of it is he’s always getting himself talked into do-gooding jobs. Heck, I ask him to go out for a drink and he hems and haws about it, but I break both my legs and he drops everything to drive my cab for months and live in my apartment? That’s what it takes to get the guy’s attention? Well if there’s a silver lining to  _ any  _ of this…

...that doesn’t mean anything. I’d rather the cab sit in a garage for weeks and have him come to visit for more than an hour just cause I’m laid up. I dunno. He’s there if I need him. That night, I said I needed him to come by. 

And he was there in -- I dunno, less time than he should have, I know where his apartment is. I let him in and he says, “What’s going on, Jack?”

I just said, “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“Yeah.”

“Is this about...Dolly?”

Girl I just stopped seeing. It would have been easier if it was about that, and I almost said it was. But then he crossed the room while I was tied up on my own silver tongue, sat on the bed like he lived there and I just -- I knew he’d see my eye twitch before I could even start to lie about it. 

I sat next to him, said, “I dunno, I don’t think so, Mac. I just feel like shit.”

“Language,” he said, but I could tell he didn’t mean it. And I noticed, then, the bed wasn’t actually that big, and there we were, sitting up next to each other, elbow-to-elbow. The place was warmer than it usually was, not just cause I was drunk. I wondered then if Mac could tell. Probably, when I think about it.

“Well. I guess sometimes I get that way when I haven’t eaten anything. You had dinner?”

“Guess.”

“Hey, that doesn’t sound like the Jack I know.”

He was trying, you know. And he looked at me-- a little longer, blinking those baby blues right next to me on the bed, for a second I thought,  _ it’s like Dolly --  _ and then he was up to the fridge. Course, there was nothing in it, course he was right. But there was a TV dinner in the freezer, and he put that into the microwave I keep on top of that milk crate. Leaned against the wall, watching it, then looking at me. But he didn’t push for anything.

You know, we’ve been friends for years, and he’d give me the shirt off my back if I didn’t have one. But that time-- felt like he was really doing something for me, you know? 

You don’t know. 

Kind of pathetic, really. Friends for years, and every time I think I’ll never imagine bending him over a kitchen table, something like this happens. Mac deserves better. 

I don’t know why he tries, except. He does that with everyone. So I guess I know why. 

So he brings me this soup of oily noodles with a spoon, cause that’s what he can find. Alfredo. Tasted better than they ever have, and he just sat and watched. No ‘I dunno how you can eat that stuff, Jack’, with that stupid eyebrow knot of his. It’s got green stuff in it anyways! Looks green. 

But he was right, like always. Felt. A little better when I finished it up. At least I could say a bit more, and he was right there still! Arm against mine.

So I said, “I dunno, Mac. I guess I’m feeling kind of stuck with this taxi thing. Not getting anywhere. I thought it’d get me out of this hovel, meet some people. Mostly just get yelled at.”

“Aw, come on, Jack! The place isn’t so bad. Could use some cleaning, but I could come by to help with that.”   
  


I didn’t really want to hear that, you know. I like the mess, until I don’t, and then, I liked the mess. So I said, “I’m just tired of not doing anything does me any  _ good _ , you know?”

“Huh. Didn’t expect you to say that,” is what Mac said back. Then he’s got that thinking look, different tilt to his eyebrows, see, lips all drawn out nice and pretty...damnit. That’s me doing that again. 

Anyways. Then’s when he turned to me, and we’re almost nose-to-nose then, and says, “Yeah. I know the feeling.”

Looks forward, stares off a minute. I was so surprised I didn’t know what to say. I mean, Mac’s always seemed...happy. What he does, helping people. I mean, heck. Guess on most days I feel the same way about the cab. Most. Maybe three out of five days. Well, when I’ve got the plane, I’ll take another of those days off, plus, I’ll be flying.

  
  
  
  


Stupid dreaming. No way the price of a cab is enough to get a plane with. Anyways. Mac wasn’t done talking. 

“Taking odd jobs, doing what helps people. I like the work. But I dunno, Jack. Sometimes feels like I should be doing more. Keeps getting -- stuck on the same stuff.”

“Stuck, yeah. That’s about right. Same story, same customers, faces are different, but it’s all the same. Can’t keep it up.”

“Yeah.”

“Something’s gonna give.”

I said that, you know. 

Something’s gonna give. 

And he turns his head, and looks at me, and I swear to god, I’d swear to you on-- whatever you want, mother mary, my own mother rest her soul-- it was something  _ different _ he looked at me like. Like he was going to roll on top of me right then and there.

I blinked. I’d never seen anything like that on Mac’s face before, felt it go straight to my head. And then he was up and asking me if I was done with the TV dinner. I say yeah, he takes it, throws it out, asks, “Feeling better?”

Barely asks. I said yeah, cause -- I didn’t know what else to say. And it-- well, I didn’t feel that bad anymore, but I felt a whole lot of other things I thought were old news.

Then -- he was out. It wasn’t like him. Like some kind of blackout fever dream, only I’d only had two beers, now that I’m remembering. 

  
  
  
  
  


Anyways, seeing as I’m admitting to this for the court, not too long after he left I spent a long time in the shower. Hah. Now I’ll really have to throw this--

RAP! RAP! RAP! 

Shit, I--

  
Jack? Hey, I brought takeout?

Mac? Oh-- hey, I was just, I was just, um. 

Listening to the Walkman, yeah! I thought you’d want some new tapes, how are you liking Fleetwood Mac?

Oh, I -- I love it, uh, do you mind if I keep the tape? Can’t stop listening to it, heh -- shit!

KLUNK, CRACK.   
  


I got it Jack, don’t worry -- looks like it’s still running

OFF! 

  
  
  


I mean, turn it off --

Okay?

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> ...and there's where I ended it! You can pick what happens next, I suppose :) I wrote it as "could be canon with _Fly by Knight_"; but I like the thought of Mac accidentally hearing the tape and them having to uh, Deal With That too. 
> 
> Comments as always, welcome and loved <3 thanks for reading!


End file.
